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Racing to the Celestial City

Yesterday was a pretty horrible day across Belgium and northern France. The man on French radio described the weather as “ridiculous” for August and that seemed about right, as I drove through endless streaming rain and dodged huge puddles. When I got back into France I decided to retreat for a while into motor racing history and set off for a lap of the long gone Circuit de l’Argonne, used 110 years ago, for a series of major international events. I did it for no reason other than it was there and I was not in a rush. It is always good to remind oneself from where the sport came and the fabulous old road tracks of Europe put a lot in perspective, particularly when you remember how basic the cars were at the time. In the modern age race tracks are fiddly things, Spa and Monza being the only ones that truly flow, but in the early days the sport was all about going flat out on fast open roads. These circuits were grandiose in conception and mightily impressive for the spectators, even if they saw the cars only a few times. The road was quick almost all the way, going straight across undulating hills with dips and crests and through classic avenues of French plane trees. There was a splendid section overlooking a large lake and several very grand estates and houses. One may travel faster today than the heroes did in their rickety racers, but one cannot help but be impressed at what they did.

History is a good place to hide when the present is unpleasant, but at the moment F1 is not a nasty place, but rather producing not only good races, but also exciting off track activity as Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg play at being Tom and Jerry. We have learned that Rosberg has a darker side and that Lewis has a rather endearing Peter Pan-like innocence. But there is much subtlety in the goings on than the screaming headlines do not quite grasp. Nico did not set out to crash into Lewis at Les Combes on lap 2 of the Belgian Grand Prix, but he did make the conscious decision not to back out of a place where he ought not to have been when he tried to overtake. He said he was proving a point. Showing Lewis, presumably, that he cannot always treat the race track as his own territory as he tends to do in a fight. Nico was roundly condemned by his own team for his actions and the British press leapt on the bandwagon, painting Nico as black as a Ninja. Perhaps it was a smart thing to do, to lay down a marker and try to destabilize Lewis some more, but the execution was flawed when it came to the media because an annoyed Hamilton saw no reason to play the game any longer. If Rosberg was going to resort to dubious tactics, Lewis was going to make sure the world understood.

There was a marvelous moment of theatre at Mercedes when at one point after the race Rosberg was downstairs explaining that he had not done it on purpose, while upstairs Hamilton was revealing that Nico had told the team he could have backed out of the move, but chose not to…

When the incident occurred, I was sure that Rosberg was to blame. He had by his action materially affected a rival’s race – not to mention the World Championship – and I was astonished that there was not even an investigation into the incident. I did not think it deliberate because of the risk factors (which ruined both of their races) but it looked like a mistake that ought to have been punished because it was clearly not fair for Hamilton, but nothing happened. We concluded that the FIA’s new policy of allowing racing without penalizing every move that goes wrong was to blame for this lack of action. The problem with this is that if you let such things go, it creates precedents that can and will be exploited later by the unscrupulous. Sometimes the cry of “it was an accident” is a straight lie so allowing the boys to race without fear of being penalized only opens the way for dirty driving tactics.

So no action was taken because the FIA did not see the need and no team asked for the incident to be looked into because, even in the oft-bizarre F1 world teams are still smart enough not to be protesting themselves.

However the post-race revelations end up making the FIA look foolish, because there was a level of intent that had been completely overlooked up in Race Control. In another age, the FIA would now be holding an investigation and we would be off to the Place de la Concorde in a week or two for a Mosleyan coup de théatre, but in the age of Todt, not even dynamite can force a decisive gesture on the part of the President. Some see this as weakness, and it is hard to argue against that. All too often when it comes to power, Emperors parade themselves on horses, clad in invisible new clothes and the crowd is led to believe them, lest they are seen to be stupid by their peers. But in the case of Todt all that appears to be on the back of the horse is an empty pile of clothing.

As for Rosberg, the incident serves only to demolish his carefully-constructed image that he is a jovial boy-next-door kind of figure. And it raises questions about the incident in qualifying in Monaco, and the jumped chicane in Montreal. Lewis is a tough competitor, but he generally plays it fair. There’s nothing underhand about him.

For those who have never read A Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan, the next paragraph will be of little use, but one wonders now whether Nico has followed other F1 challengers down the path of cynical ambition towards Vanity Fair, leaving Hamilton to wade through the Slough of Despond. They are both aiming for the Celestial City but who will get there first?

Onward to the next Wacky Race…

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A wee question… I am no chemist, so I find myself wondering about Lewis’s start in Belgium. If you do a practice start for the formation lap, re-heat the rear tyres before coming to the grid, then stop beyond the start box and roll back to your marks, is there a nice little rubber-to-rubber bond formed for the first metre off the start? He did make a fantastic start…

Actually Lewis’s start seemed on a par with several cars around him, the opposite was the case for Rosberg whose slow start made Lewis’s pace seem special. Not sure what Nico’s issue off the grid was but I’m fairly sure there was nothing so unusual about Lewis’s

This is the most sensible piece I’ve read on the Mercedes farce – by far. I did find myself wondering what the monetary value of those 18 points Nico gained might turn out to be, but it’s rather too early to say I guess. I wonder if it’ll have any effect on sales of Mercedes road cars next year?

An unenviable task for the Mercedes management to sort out. My solution would be to tell both drivers that the next one who misbehaves, will be replaced by the test driver, who I think is Paul di Resta, for Abu Dhabi. By that time, the Manufacturers’ Championship should be safely in the bag. Neither driver would I think, risk losing a potential 50 points and this would ensure politer and safer behaviour towards each other.

I agree about replacing an offending driver with the reserve driver, this to my mind is the only penalty that may have any effect. However I think the next race would do it, the final is too much… but a very sensible idea! The only thing is Rosberg has already overstepped the boundary and currently is profiting from putting himself ahead of the team, at the cost of 25 team points. What to do? Reserve driver for the next race?

Do you really think Nico Rosberg would allow the team to replace him for one race, possibly costing him the drivers title? That would be the end of the relationship, and pretty quickly they find themselves pay him millions just to terminate his contract. Rightly or wrongly, Michael Schumacher was no slouch when it came to pushing the boundaries (cheating) in pursuit of his numerous world titles. I think Nico achieved what he set out to do,he extended his points lead, and he rattled Lewis.Result!

The thing is, he has made it clear that he would rather deliberately crash both cars and see Mercedes lose both championships than be beaten by Hamilton. Mercedes has a really bad problem and drastic action is required….

Merc management could easy impose a simple penalty (and reduce the chance of on-track battles between their drivers) by changing the gearbox of the offending party. Not terminal, arguably more likely to lead to a good points haul than putting a reserve into the car, but roughly equivalent to the sort of penalty the FIA might ordinarily hand out.

Possibly. Doesn’t have to be underhanded, could be very clear and public but they have the right to do it and it penalises the offending party on the track – which is the only thing either driver really cares about.

Hi Joe, good article – good to see someone lay it out without the partisanship or hysteria.

I’m not sure that this should have been picked up by the stewards at the race, it was a touch in an abortive overtake and both, as you say, lost out. However, I suspect there is reason to call Nico in now for bringing the sport into disrepute or some such. The new laisez-faire attitude by the Stewards is making for better races, recently it was getting to the point that if you tried to overtake outside a DRS zone you’d be up before the beak!

The troubling thing is the inconsistency: Hamilton (rightly) took his line and expected Nico to back out at the crunch as he wasn’t too far past – Magnusson against Alonso got no such benefit of the doubt though – admittedly I’ve not seen any video of this other than a brief helicopter shot but Alonso’s car is also capable of braking.

About the Rosberg-Hamilton incident, Rosberg expected Hamilton to make way, it seems. He wouldn’t hit Lewis on purpose since it could take out himself too – Rosberg wouldn’t risk his chances that away.

Rosberg would profit even if he crashed out due to a clash. He would maintain his points gap and axing another opportunity for Lewis to gain. It would be naive to think Nico hadn’t thought of this very scenario many times. So, while he may not have planned this, it certainly was a conscious factor in how aggressively he held his line.

I think I go with Toto Wolff’s initial reaction about Rosberg. It was unacceptable. It was also either supreme calculation or rank amateurism. Look at the way drivers with superb skills can dodge and weave such as Alonso and Button. All these drivers have so called FIA super licences. I would expect 16 year old Max Verstappen would know that you couldn’t overtake there and not risk his front wing. I think I will sum up the incident with the word ‘inept’. Rosberg’s reputation is fast being tarnished.

The thing that baffles me is that with that sort of contact, and it can be seen at almost every race at the first corner, most of the time the rear tyre of the car in front remains intact but the front wing of the car behind is *always* damaged. The calculation doesn’t really go in Rosberg’s favour.

If Lewis hadn’t had the puncture, Rosberg would have ruined his race for nothing and finished third (or worse without pitstop priority?) with his tail between his legs.

@Jem @Nick T.
That’ exactly what I meant in my comment. The calculation of malice really does not add up since you cannot orchestrate the things that would happen when your car gets in the way of another.

“Lewis is a tough competitor, but he generally plays it fair. There’s nothing underhand about him.”

I don’t need to remind you about what happened in Australian GP 2009.

Also when Hamilton was coming from behind in Germany this year, he did hit Button and maybe a few others like he was owning the track. If that is racing incident then this too can be “rightly” classified as a racing incident. This is basically a storm in a tea-cup situation.

Not to forget Alonso hit Vettel on the last lap and no one bothered to even have a look at it.

Yes Hamilton’s title chances suffered but had this happened in the first race, I am not sure there will be so much scrutiny and debate.

A bit simplistic and hardly fair or complete story. How convenient for you.

What McLaren – the team, not Hamilton the individual – stood accused of by the WMSC was that:

* on 29 March, 2009, McLaren team told the stewards of the Australian Grand Prix that no instructions were given to [Lewis] Hamilton in Car No 1 to allow [Jarno] Trulli in Car No 9 to pass when both cars were behind the safety car, knowing this statement to be untrue;

* McLaren team procured its driver Hamilton the current World Champion, to support and confirm this untrue statement to the stewards;

* although knowing that as a direct result of its untrue statement to the stewards, another driver and a rival team had been unfairly penalised, McLaren team made no attempt to rectify the situation either by contacting the FIA or otherwise;

* on 2 April, 2009, at a second hearing before the stewards of the Australian Grand Prix, (meeting in Malaysia) McLaren team made no attempt to correct the untrue statement of 29 March but, on the contrary, continued to maintain that the statement was true, despite being allowed to listen to a recording of the team instructing Hamilton to let Trulli past and despite being given more than one opportunity to correct its false statement;

* on 2 April, 2009, at the second stewards’ hearing, McLaren team procured its driver Hamilton to continue to assert the truth of the false statement given to the stewards on 29 March, while knowing that what he was saying to the stewards was not true.

That Hamilton “lied” at all was only true in the technical sense, as he was forced to support the deceit of the team itself, with Dave Ryan sacked and then Dennis himself relinquishing the TP role to Whitmarsh to satisfy the rage of FIA.

I don’t think Dipak’s comment is either simplistic or unfair. Hamilton did indeed lie to the Stewards. Whether the Team asked him to is not the point; he’s an adult, was the reigning World Champion at the time and presumably understood the concept of ethics.

Hamilton “lied” under duress. Presumably you understand the concept of power dynamics (especially “imbalance”)?

And frankly, if you’re going to be so critical of Hamilton for being bullied by his team in 2009, I hope you’re cheering loudly now for him given that his first inclination was to be open and honest with the media about his teammate’s own deceitful admission of culpability for causing an otherwise avoidable collision (that he [NR] then obfuscated – if not outright lied about – afterwards)!!

Precisely Andrew.
Yes team asked Hamilton to lie so he did. Look what happened to Nelson Piquet Jr. when he did what the team asked him to do. Remember Bernie’s comment “You cant rob a bank cos Bernie asked you to do” or something like that.

Nicely thought out. I am sitting on the fence as well.
Do Mercedes have a reserve driver ? Should he get an outing at Monza ?
Joe , on another tack, is it time the FIA were a little more responsible in issuing super licences do you think ?

Joe, It may sound cynical but i do not believe that Rosberg has not been investigated simply because of the FIA’s new hands off approach. On several occasions (Monaco/Canada/Spa) this season he has gotten away with incidences others would have been punished for and he probably has developed a sense of entitlement even within his team as he half expects them to back him case in point Hungary.

It also calls into question all the issues that have been happening on Lewis’ side of the garage

I don’t think it is quite as plain as Nico
playing the happy boy next door, and Lewis being Peter Pan in the innocence department! Clearly Nico did not set out to harm their races, but equally he was obviously making a statement as in, ” I won’t be pushed around or intimidated by you “….or indeed, ” if you don’t follow team orders, then we will have to play by different rules “.
It was right to call it a racing incident imho. And the root cause is weak team management. Toto, Paddy & Niki do not seem to have any authority over either Nico or Lewis. It seems clear to me that what MB need is Ross Brawn, and he must have been spluttering into his beer if he was looking at the race on his tv!
The interesting point is that RedBull seem to be countering their lack of BHP with aero set ups that make their car probably the overall 2nd quickest at this moment. If they can maintain that level, or surpass it, and if Williams and Ferrari continue to underperform against them, then Ricciardo stands an outside chance of toppling both Lewis & Nico. Indeed, if not for his DSQ in Oz, he would be very close to Lewis now. If MB don’t control the fighting, then Daniel could end up doing a Prost as in 1986….and the similarities between Mansell & Piquet, and the MB drivers are quite striking…..also Williams allowed their guys to race uncontrolled too.
It was interesting to hear Lewis talking of saving engines, do RBR need to do that as much with Ricciardo? Will unreliability hold the Mercs back? As in the last 4 years, RBR are looking very slick right now and Ricciardo is clearly enjoying his racing and his team, something that Lewis & Nico may not be having as much fun at….frankly, I don’t get fanned up over any team these days, but I do support an underdog, and it would be absolutely fabulous, if Ricciardo could steal the WCD from Merc, especially when one considers how much MB has invested in getting both Titles, and just how far superior their car has been over the whole field.

Yes, this incident probably started on Thursday when the team ok’d Lewis ignoring a direct team order (given by Paddy Lowe) to let Nico overtake.

I am also not sure if it wise to publicly condemn one of your own drivers the way Mercedes have done, it just does not help anybody. On the contrary, I makes Nico more resolved than before to stick to his guns, and it might have encouraged Lewis to brief the press on a inter-team debriefing. To me, this increases the impression that Toto and Wolf has lost control over both drivers.

Modern research suggests that leadership is very much about manging other peoples emotions (and your own), in this respect Mercedes is clearly failing at the moment, and Ross Brawn is indeed a good example of how it is done.

Good points by Damian and Cabby. Ultimately this is fast beginning to look like a failure of leadership and lack of respect from the drivers to the team management. You cannot be someone’s friend as a leader, you have to be their boss. Perhaps having three “leaders” isn’t working for the team. I would imagine the Mercedes Board would not be pleased that their technical triumph is being overshaddowed by squabbling between spoilt drivers.

Teams don’t have control of their drivers unless the drivers are willing to be controlled. Look at Reutemann in 1981. His contract said he had to yield to Jones but with a race win in sight he refused to comply. Hamilton and Rosberg are in a two horse race for the championship and all the Mr Nice Guy stuff will evaporate. If they were driving for Force India there’d be no trouble.

The incident was mostly or entirely Nico’s fault which meets one of the FIA’s new criteria for imposing a penalty. So I think the stewards’ only reason for not penalising him during the race was that Merc didn’t protest.

As Joe points out, teams won’t protest themselves so does this mean the FIA is completely washing its hands of intra-team incidents (except for proven deliberate crashes)?

In some ways that makes sense – it’s up to the team to discipline its own drivers – but what meaningful sanctions can a team use without hurting itself as much as the driver?

Old disused motor racing circuits can be eerie places. Catalina Park in Katoomba (Australia) several years after the last race I walked the track and then I drove my car around.
I hung around for ages thinking about about the blokes who had raced there the Geoghegan bros, Brock, Foley, Beechey and the others. It was all a bit surreal.

I thought the same about Rosberg making a stupid mistake, after reading what you and others have written ….what a dick he is.

The most distilled thought I can arrive at, is that Nico means to build a 50 point gap, asap.

What I think is at the back of his mind, is .. and this can only be my distant view .. that there is such distrust built up that he doesn’t believe a word when it comes from management. I can’t settle on a view that seems to reflect the management’s position, because it doesn’t seem consistent at all, it seems to depend on who is talking, and then when pressed the calls for harmony and team cohesion seem to be protestations. I don’t think it impossible that the drivers are confused also, and maybe a aspect of Lewis’ Peter Pan disposition is that he is just that little bit more disconnected from what passes as reality within the team. I believe Nico has more than just the measure of him, and there’s a sense I perceive of a broken illusion.

I’ve often wondered about his half turned smiles, and what may be going on, under his blond mop, that makes his lips curl upwards in seemingly quiet approval of the results of his cogitations. Has he hoodwinked the lot of us, playing homeboy right until his “perfect week”, only to show his true color, the moment he has it all in hand?

The expressions on the faces of all concerned were amazing. Nico I think shocked himself. Now he’s painted himself into a corner. Toto and Nikki were apoplectic, mad as hell because their expectations of a controllable progression to the last, and hence their authority, which strikes me as the precarious kind undermined by internecine rivalry, are shattered. Nico may now find he’s set up as the bad boy, and that may not be a role he’s best suited to playing. His honesty struck me as part of that shock. I’m sure Lewis must think the gloves are off. But what of the illusion, or illusions, will be preserved?

I’m getting dizzy thinking about this!

So what will the next races look like? How many tricks do the drivers have control over, form the cockpit? Will the team take away the toys? I don’t think this management is past “addressing the issue” with engineering.

Suddenly I feel as if it is a three way battle now, drivers themselves each feeling conflict with the team. Which then is four or even five way, depending if you count Paddy. The MB chorus may sing of harmony, but they sound Greek to me, as the tone changes.

I believe much of this has been caused by management’s outspoken views as to the drivers, and overt partisanship. How will Stuttgart react, now their golden boy has soot on his face? Was this Nico’s move to force a clear Number One situation? Consider his mentor..

As for “engineering solutions”, I can see PU component wear being made the excuse, “because we must, for the team, ensure our drivers first finish”… oh, oh, oh…

I don’t think I’ve been able to so closely observe a team destabilizing itself before. I guess the consolation prize is nothing will be dull, in the weeks ahead.

Now, what of the real moves, afoot in F1? Surely not a bad time to be tinkering in the back rooms, whilst the media sets to what must look to some to be a many course feast?

Thank you for your considered thoughts on this. Great as always, like your books.

I cannot remember two bosses being as angry as Toto and Niki were after the race. I am not sure if you have seen their TV interviews on SKY and BBC. They were furious. Did that fury come through when you and your colleagues spoke with them. Rosberg was also quite dismissive about Niki’s role in Mercedes “Toto and Paddy are the bosses Niki just gives advice” or words to that effect.

What other incidents can you recall when bosses condemned their driver so clearly?

I remember Ron Dennis’s anger in Hungary 2007 but even though he is not known for holding back it came nowhere near to Sunday.

I wonder how much of the anger was due to Mercedes Board members being at the race and being embarrassed. Not a good memory for them next time Toto/Paddy/Niki asks for more funding or driver pay rises.

LOL. Do you know how little revenue this site most likely generates from ads? No offense to Joe Saward, who I respect a lot, but this blog … I dont even think it has any ads, or maybe just 1! lol…yeah, getting rich off F1 he is…

Nico has now done too many things that mean that everyone will view him in a different light. First to use engine mode, Monaco, Canada and now Spa. People can try and spin this latest episode how they like but he decided to cause an accident.

I mean with hindsight he wasn’t even alongside him, he was so far back and had totally lost the corner. I think he must have been properly angry at Lewis after Hungary and has clearly harboured a massive grudge possibly also with the team. I wonder also if he was worried in the back of his mind that he felt that Lewis was winning the internal battle inside Mercedes so he was trying to wrestle it back by making Lewis at fault. Ironically now though he has done the opposite but increased his lead!

What I would really like to know is why there was no investigation. Earlier in the season Magnusson recieved a penalty and also penalty points for ruining Kimi’s race much in the same way?

Hi Joe,
I often travel in the Argonne region but can hardly find any reference to the old track. Can you tell me which town/villages are on that circuit ?
Regarding the aftermath of the Combes saga, do you really believe Nico will be punished ?

The circuit had more than one layout. It started at the modern roundabout at Mazagran, where the D946 meets the D977. It followed the D946 to Rethel and then went up what is now the D951 to Faissault, passing beneath the ground where the great pig of Woinic now stands. look on a map and you can see the track of the old road. Follow the D951 until it becomes the D991 all the way down to Le Chesne. Then the D977 to Vouziers. And from there on the D946 back to Mazagran.

“Lewis is a tough competitor, but he generally plays it fair. There’s nothing underhand about him.”

Precisely why I’m a fan. That and I think he’d pass anyone’s “would enjoy a pint with” test. I don’t believe, as some do, I think only because they see that scene as a undesirable one, or supposedly bad influence of management or of his girlfriend, that the man’s sold out to the rap and music crowd.

How he performs now, however, will decide a great deal how he will settle in my pantheon of drivers. I think that “tough but fair” has been redrawn, by Nico, and I expect Lewis to step up his aggression also, but control, please let him have it under control. Whacky Races may be the prospect, but it’s not what he needs.

I’m conflicted, though, as to how this is going to play out. Before I retreated to my cool darkened room (to bed) yesterday, I had misgivings, and convinced myself that there’s going to be a upheaval and Lewis will turn up in a red car alongside Fernando. I think there’s a big question mark, hanging over both teams, MB and Ferrari, both management wise and driver lineup. Some thought required… I don’t have a satisfactory handle on the dynamics, in this age of “no No.1 drivers”.

“Lewis is a tough competitor, but he generally plays it fair. There’s nothing underhand about him.”

Precisely why I’m a fan. That and I think he’d pass anyone’s “would enjoy a pint with” test. I don’t believe, as some do, I think only because they see that scene as a undesirable one, or supposedly bad influence of management or of his girlfriend, that the man’s sold out to the rap and music crowd.”

I agree. Some people just cannot see past his social media character and think that he desperately wants to be a ‘rapper’ or whatever. I think it’s partly because there hasn’t been a driver like him in the past, ‘black’ (for want of a better word, I hasten to add), into the US music scene, american singer gf, lots of social media content (often featuring Roscoe and Coco etc, the amount of grief he gets for daring to post stuff not directly related to F1 is unreal), his life outside of racing is at odds with the stereotypical F1 fan: middle class white guys in our 20’s to 40’s, I suspect. He appears to give it 120% when on track and shock horror his emotions get the better of him, thank god he’s a real human being and not a robot like quite a few of the others..

Curiously I disagree – I don’t think I’d particularly enjoy sitting and having a chat to Lewis Hamilton other than the fact he’s a Formula 1 driver. I more or less agree with Joe’s assessment, but the petulance of various outbursts off the track leaves question marks over his personality for me.

Back in Monaco, Nico was sure he’d prove to be tougher than Lewis [ remember the “Good luck with that” comment?]
For a driver who’s taking a long term view, to win the championship, this was an oddly short term, irrational act.

Lewis seems to have had some good media training since Monaco: is this the first time we’ve seen him as effective out of the car as when he’s in it?

Maybe the pressure’s taking its toll on Nico?

===
Following the current laissez faire approach, the Race Stewards were right to treat it as a racing incident.

The FIA could have taken a driver’s additional comments on the incident as a reason to check the telemetry, and take another look. Perhaps they’re choosing not to view this as being only egos at risk, and they’re within the same team.

That’s wrong: it’s a safety issue. Accidents should be avoided, and anybody wilfully failing to avoid an accident should expect close scrutiny.

Why do you watch F1? Why bother? Why bother commenting if you are going to turn off after a couple of laps? Your time is obviously too valuable to watch the whole race, but you feel your opinion is valid about something you could not be arsed to watch. You sound like some sulky child frankly,

Why waste your time on those first two laps? And did you watch the build-up too, you could have mowed the lawn with that time. I’m a Lewis fan and I was gutted when he went out… But you still have 20-odd of the world’s best drivers to fill your Sunday with, is that not something you want to see? In my humble opinion, if your favourite driver failing to finish is a good enough reason to stop watching a sport you would probably claim you loved, you are watching motorsport (possibly ALL sport) for the wrong reasons. Sorry Peter, I can’t really respect the opinion of someone who storms out when things aren’t going the way they’d like. It’s like Eastenders.

I don’t believe this to have been done on purpose, in the sense that Rosberg pointed his car at Hamitons and purposely drove into him. I do, however, believe, like yourself, that it was careless driving and should not have gone unpunished by the FIA. Drivers are full of tricks they can deploy on the track and then plead total innocence in the press conference of being guilty of any misdemeanour, and to the ordinary fan, these tricks are not at first apparent, hence the questionable events in Monaco, Canada, and now this. Not surprisingly, Lewis is aware of what these tricks are and so this may explain his behaviour in pressing his belief that it was done purposely. But we are getting involved in a game of semantics if we ask the question “when is deliberate not classed as deliberate”, and the answer comes back “when the driver chooses not to avoid a collision.”…………..

It now unfortunately rests with how Mercedes are going to deal with it. It should be, as your article points out, how the FIA should have dealt with it. It really shouldn’t be this way.

I don’t see what the fuss is about Rosberg’s failed pass on Hamilton. You see the same twice a lap in any F3 race. Poorly executed no doubt, but all Rosberg did was back out a fraction too late. Had Nico lost his wing and Lewis been undamaged the press would not have been wailing that Hamilton had deliberately knocked off Nicos wing. Had Nico been a touch quicker to lift off we would have been told that he was showing his determination and praised for being willing to to race wheel to wheel. It is not all the British that worship Lewis. I am British and want Rosberg to win. The World Championship is for grown ups.

Well of course he would assume that, where else was Lewis supposed to go ? He had the inside line, steer even further to the right and drive off the track perhaps ? Nico knew exactly what would happen by not backing out, all of the drivers on track are capable of understanding that. He chose not to back out and cause the collision.

But LH took the first of the corners with NR alongside. Important to note that there is sufficient room for both cars to negotiate that and the following corners (Les Combes 5&6 I think) abreast if the drivers accept their position NR on the left and LH on the right.

While NR didn’t deviate, LH decided to cut across causing the contact and puncture, so who’s the idiot for putting their car in harms way? and how does NR suddenly become the fall guy when all he done is to maintain his position?

Nice piece Joe, though I am not completely sure that Hamilton is a more fair sportsman than Nico. We all knew he is ruthless (like Alonso, Senna and other champions) and will resort to mind games and dirty tactics once in a while (hungary 2007 for one) It is just that we haven’t seen this characteristic in Nico before. It is fascinating to see what a title race like this one can reveal about the drivers!!

It was always going to be a very clumsy and tearful move and he should have factored in the effect it would have on his standing within the team. Mind you, this thing was always going to happen with these two and will probably happen again.

Any idea what Todt is trying to achieve by this lack of concern about F1, never mind driving standards?

I keep getting the impression that JT got his nose bloodied by The Bernard in some of the power plays in F1 (Michelin tyres for instance) and prefers to keep his distance from the circus. Formula 1 may be the FIA’s flagship racing series but it doesn’t have much influence on the FIA Presidential elections.

To see what went into this, one has to only look at what was said both before and after the race. Rosberg began with:

“I learned various things from that race which I will adapt for the future.”

Hamilton was quoted saying:

“It’s interesting because we had that meeting on Thursday and Nico expressed how angry he was [about Hungary]. I was thinking ‘It’s been three weeks and you’ve been lingering?! He expressed how angry he was, and he literally sat there and said how angry he was at Toto and Paddy.”

Then we had THE INCIDENT. Merc management were furious, Wolff said:

“There is one rule and that is that you don’t crash into each other. And it has happened on lap two.”

Then came Hamilton’s dramatic press quote from the internal Mercedes meeting:

“It looked quite clear to me but we just had a meeting about it and he basically said he did it on purpose,” and…

“He said he did it on purpose, he said he could have avoided it. He said ‘I did it to prove a point’, he basically said ‘I did it to prove a point’. And you don’t have to just rely on me, go and ask Toto [Wolff], Paddy [Lowe] and all those guys who are not happy with him as well.”

So what was Rosberg’s “point” and to whom was he proving it? It was a point about following team orders, of doing or not doing what the team told the drivers to do. He was proving this point to the team management, to Wolff and Lowe whom he was so furious with on Thursday. His point was simply that if Hamilton does not need to listen to the teams instructions then neither does he.

So was this a deliberate hit? Absolutely. Did he say to the team that it was? yes of course, how else could he make his point to them? (but not openly in plain language of course.) Would have Wolff and Lowe heard and understood? Yes of course. Would they say publicly that Rosberg had admitted it like Hamilton said he did? No of course not, that would lead to the FIA opening a case against Rosberg and the team losing all their point from the weekend and facing huge public embarrassment. Could the FIA work this out themselves and act? Only if they were not the proverbial 3 blind mice which unfortunately they are.

So what does Mercedes do now? Probably nothing that will make any real difference. But if they were wise they would sit Rosberg out in the next race and put the reserve drive in the car, making a return “point” to Rosberg (and Hamilton) that if he does not listen and jeopardises the team like that again he will not be part of it.

All fine except in a situation like this the back end of an F1 car is more likely to survive a touch than is the front wing. Therefore on your judgement, NR must be pretty dumb as he did not consider that LH would survive a touch, whereas he ( NR ) would probably lose his front wing on that side and incur a big pit stop penalty as a result?

During the Mansell era I for one despaired of him winning a WDC given the plethora and dominance of talented drivers around then. But that changed in ’91’ when he grew ‘some’ and laid down that marker for Senna at the Spanish GP.

Rosberg has similar problems to overcome which are more to do with Hamilton’s emulation of Senna’s ‘I’m coming through, we can collide or you can pull out’ attitude, then perhaps Hamilton’s innate ability behind the wheel.

Now it appears that (like Mansell), he’s decided at last to demonstrate that when contesting a piece of tarmac he’ll not relinquish it simply because someone has a hankering to take it.

On the collision itself it was the minimalist of touches, an incident that would normally go largely unreported. However Rosberg is being now quite unfairly being castigated and vilified by UK’s press and according to some actually at Spa the unsporting but vocal brit contingent at the race, which is regrettable.

Yet the incident occurred as Hamilton, fully aware of the proximity of Rosberg’s car, still exercised his (Senna-like) choice of ignoring it and took the racing line.
Rosberg wasn’t guilty of causing a collision as he’s quite entitled to attempt an overtake, neither car was out of control and there was sufficient track to accommodate both cars.

So at best it was a racing incident and at worse the causal factor was Hamilton’s move to the racing line when Rosberg was already there, though backing off.

Finally lets be accurate, neither Wollf nor Lauda cite Rosberg as the cause of what occurred, what they said that a collision between teammates was unacceptable. Later they would clarify with the comment that while Rosberg expected Hamilton to give him room, Hamilton (perhaps arrogantly), expected Rosberg to cede the space to him. Rosberg wasn’t in any mood to do so.

With hindsight, justice was done with Rosberg’s recovery to second. Maybe now Hamilton will be more circumspect of those kamikaze moves that depend on the largess of others to avoid collisions.

Especially those involving a very personable, intelligent and honest Nico Rosberg who’s now put down the marker and more determined then ever not to be affected nor dominated by Hamilton on or off the track.

Now on Hamilton’s insinuations re: Rosberg, what the guy has is a failure of recall where cheating and lying are concerned and would do himself a favour in keeping it buttoned until he is both sure of the facts and his intellectual ability to understand the implications of running off at the mouth.

What space was Nico occupying? They weren’t level and banging wheels. In case you haven’t seen it, Nico’s front wing punctured Lewis ‘s rear tyre. Lewis had the corner and the racing line. Mercedes officials confirmed after the race that what Lewis said was pretty much accurate. So spin it all you like. The Clark’s, Brabham’s and Hill’s didn’t need to hit their team mates to win titles.

No I think it’s either Lewis or Hamilton usually without too much warmth as the guy doesn’t really connect or illicit great respect. Now Alonso, well, he remains distantly private but is respected by practically everyone and you know it’s genuine, sadly not Hamilton though.

But I’d hope the vast silent majority have seen it your way, you’d lose all faith in humanity if you believed any differently. Certainly there’s the blameless-racing incident-clumsy or at worst the totally at fault brigade who are probably in a very small minority even here thankfully. If only because it’s better to see objectivity then the obvious blind jingoism or ignorance.

Most fall into the clumsy/racing incident bracket which is good when your forming opinion with limited information. Problem I think for some its a matter of pride to support right or wrong or simply not wanting to admit to getting it wrong after the initial reaction.
But those interested enough to comment are minuscule really and I’d speculate not at all representative of F1’s fan’s in general but it leads to a sometimes heated debate which is not always as well informed as it could be but usually interesting.

Lewis moved to the right coming up the hill to take the inside line (he was in front), at no point did Nico have the racing line, at best his front axle was JUST about level with Lewis rear axle.

Nico knew that Lewis was going to continue on the racing line (which he already had), but chose not to back out or go straight on if he was going too fast to make the left hand turn, he knew the likely consequences of doing that and thus caused the collision. It would be a very different argument if they were side by side through the corners, but they were not.

Now there’s a lot of hypothesising bandied around with regard to this minor contact with some pointing the finger of blame squarely at Rosberg and your post is no exception in that regard.

But assuming you’re right on the extent of the overlap or at least the acceptance there was some overlap and the fact LH must have been aware of NR’s car then why in turn in to the ‘racing line’ at all if you’re not 100% certain Rosberg’s no longer there? Thing was he was there and he wasn’t going anywhere so why blame Rosberg if there was,

1) more then enough space for both to get safely through corner 6 or even No7 if necessary or
2) Was it LH’s misjudgement in turning into Rosberg’s path that led to the contact.

Now LH’s manager back in his karting days comments earlier this year that back in the day nothing but nothing was ever LH’s fault, so if he’s true to form there’ll be no admission on this occasion either, but thats me hypothesising.

Central to this controversy is if the contact was the result of an error or deliberate it can’t be both, if it was an error the likelihood is it was LH’s as he was the one who changed his line.

If it was deliberate it could still be LH who was the perpetrator as he’s known to be rash behind the wheel but maybe it was the more controlled Rosberg, who somehow managed while racing and has the guile and control to puncture LH’s rear and limit his own damage to a few bits of carbon-fibre…..I suppose it’s easier to blame a german then take the view it was probably a racing incident however it was caused…..

Using that delusional logic you must be a racist for blaming Hamilton? Are you a racist?

And there is a thing universally accepted as the racing line and when you are on it another car cannot be. Would you smash in to a brick wall and then proceed to rant and scream at the wall for not seeing you and giving you room? No, because that would mean you were a simpleton. Are you a simpleton?

A perfectly valid opinion… However, I seem to recall a directive, or even a regulation (not sure which) that states that a driver must leave at least a car’s width for an attacking driver. Now, having watched the video a few times, I notice that Lewis is about two-thirds of the way to the RIGHT of the track into the braking zone for the first part of that corner sequence, he drives apex to apex for the next bit (he is a racing driver, after all), and then they collide… Worth pointing out that there is a car width’s space to the left of ROSBERG (never mind Lewis) as he makes his move. I believe that a driver is also not allowed to leave the track limits while attacking or defending, risking a penalty if he does so, so it’s hard to see what else Lewis could have done without supernatural assistance… I grudgingly agree with the stewards decision not to pursue a penalty, but I also agree with those that suggest it was a clumsy and ill-considered move on Nico’s part. And I wonder what has now been awakened…. Lewis’s post-retirement interview had a different flavour here, I fear that the ‘give way or we crash’ philosophy is about to be taken to another level – maybe not Prost/Senna, but getting that way. Wouldn’t fancy being Nico right now…

Struggling to find the incentive and the sense in any of this for Rosberg. He is devaluing his championship (if he is to win it) by his actions and he is not doing much for his image either.

Still cant understand why he just didnt leave it one more lap and use DRS to make the move and park his car on the apex to make his “point” that would have been better and would not have jeopardise his and his teammates race.

Rosberg is either very very smart or just plain lucky. And if he can be so calculating to prove a point I really do think that Monaco Quali was a premeditated act! I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, now im sure!

Rosbergs attitude after the race blaming the British fans for all the booing and saying they need to understand the sport better before being so vocal probably hasnt done him any favours. Does he want to be the pantomime villain? Hes waving a red rag to the British red top papers thats for sure. It will be like Schumacher & Hill all over again!

Me although im British im in neither camp and would actually rather Alonso win. Rosberg is out of line with his actions. But I also cant understand Hamilton, for such a tough racer on the track I just wish he would just grow a pair of cojones off it and not come across as being so moody and whiney.

My understanding is that there appears to be a general agreement that the the FIA do not investigate incidents between team mates. Its left to the team to deal with.
If Hamilton and Rosberg had been driving for different teams the incident would have been investigated “for sure” ( to quote the most overused phraseology in F1!).

Joe, are you aware of the FIA investigating incidents between teammates in current F1?

Alonso’s grid penalty for all the kerfuffle with Lewis is the one example I can think of. It’s a good example of why the FIA should keep out of intra team arguments as both drivers were acting like idiots and the decision had a material effect on the championship.

I would add that in IMHO the seeds of Sunday’s actions were sown in two distinct areas:
First, Schumacher’s racing career included gamesmanship tactics that purists took exception to. A new generation of racers learned that such behaviour by the established super-star of the time was rarely punished by the authorities. (Whether ‘bad’ or ‘unsporting’ behaviour is irrelevant – it’s the lack of enforced standards that is key).
Second, when (as I understand it) Hamilton deliberatly ignored Mercedes team orders a few weeks ago with no retribution then that re-calibrated the standard of acceptable behaviour within the Mercedes team.

I’m really pleased to see Hamilton has such great support around the world.

I think he has the greatest raw talent we’ve seen on the grid for a long time and sadly for him and us I don’t think he’s ever allowed himself to fully capitalise on this. Hamilton has spent too much time living the “LA” lifestyle in the public’s eye while Vettel, arguably a lesser driver in raw pace, has quietly won 4 championships.

I still hold out hope we’ll see a period of domination from Hamilton through his 30s.

I agree Matt, with the bit about him not fully capitalising on his abilities. I disagree on your view of Vettel. The main difference between Hammy, Vettel & Alonso, all of whom I would put on a footing together, and just above Rosberg & Button & Raikkonen, is that Alonso & Vettel do seem to work harder at their jobs than Hammy, and it seems that Hammy relies more on natural ability than on putting the effort in away from the track. There are numerous reports of Alonso & Vettel working with their Engineers late into the evening, but very few or none, of Hammy doing the same. Likewise, when the Pirellis changed a couple of years back or so, maybe when the contract started?? It was reported that Vettel was the only driver who went to the Pirelli factory over the Winter, to learn all about the new tyres…and then everyone was surprised at how good he was with them?? Gary Player, one of the greats of Golf, was asked once, why he was so successful, and replied that it surprised him too, but he found that the more he practiced the more successful he got!! People disparage Vettel but fact is he is very fast, very astute, and a very worthy 4 x WCD, a feat that few have done in 60 years,only 1 other, and even fewer have won more, only 2! It’s no point saying he only won because of having the best car. Hammy & Rosberg would not win anything in a Toro Rosso. The awful position of Alonso, is full testament to the fact that it is almost a complete impossiblility to win the WCD without driving the best car of the year.

“These circuits were grandiose in conception and mightily impressive for the spectators, even if they saw the cars only a few times.”
If you like the old circuits (as it’s clear you do), perhaps you should take a couple of days sometime to visit the Isle of Man TT circuit – it’s of the same vintage as Circuit de l’Argonne, it’s fast, it’s flowing, and it’s STILL in use.

Nico Rosberg is proving to be a real chip off the old block, as Keke was one of the toughest-minded SOBs to race single seaters in the last forty years (he once used the rear end of his nearest champioship challenger in Super Vee –either Freddy Kottulinsky or Mikko Kozarowitzky, I can’t remember –in lieu of a brake pedal.

Er… In Lewis’s corner, we have Lewis. In Nico’s, we have Nico. His dad ain’t driving the car. Now, if you’re getting into ‘my dad’s harder than your dad’ mentality (it was very popular when I was a child), I will concede that Keke was one of the hardest out there. But honestly, do you think Anthony Hamilton is a pushover? Either way, it matters not a jot. On Sundays, it’s Lewis vs Nico vs 20 other drivers, don’t matter who your dad is (if it were, Max Chilton might be having a more stellar career). Puncturing your team-mate with a clumsy move isn’t the sort of thing I’d normally associate with the Rosberg heritage you appear to have in mind… Or are you saying that, because of his Super Vee racing behaviour (don’t know much about that myself, I’m relying on what you suggest here), Nico is somehow justified in making errors while racing wheel-to-wheel? I am confused, I can see a couple of different ways of interpreting your post.

I think you’re entirely right with what you elude to Joe. Essentially Rosberg put his wheel where it shouldn’t have been in order to prove a point to Lewis – Don’t expect me to be Mr Nice Guy and don’t be surprised if it happens again if you try to pass me.

Schumacher/Senna etc did it as did many others. It’s not honourable in the slightest but I can see why they did it. Ultimate selfishness.

The problem Lewis has now is two-fold…

Firstly, he’ll be thinking just that little bit more before he attempts another pass on Rosberg.

I feel it may well go the other way – that Lewis will not give a second thought for Nico in an on-track battle. They’ve tried to mess with each other’s heads, that phase is largely now over. Now it’s all about who’s hardest/bravest/most foolhardy on the track, if you believe the hype. How do we all think that will pan out, then…?

We live in a world where penalties are largely down to consequences of actions not potential consequences – in those other incidents the “innocent” (the applicability of the word is variable) driver in front wasn’t significantly disadvantaged by damage or a puncture. If you make a risky move and come off worse, you’re seen as having already been penalised – see Schumacher/Villeneuve for example.

I hope that Lewis does, in fact, “think just that little bit more before he attempts another pass on Nico.” And, I hope that Nico races cleanly, and stands his ground fairly. Lewis seems to be the more impassioned, impetuous personality, i.e., sometimes to a fault.

I watched the incident frame by frame in slow motion on my PVR from two angles and it appears that at the last minute he actually attempts to get himself out of the way but ran out of time and space as LH was committed to the apex and heading for the inside curb. I think it was a clumsy move on Nico’s part and he tried to save face by saying he *could* have moved out of the way but didn’t – when in fact he would have had to put himself over the curb to keep from hitting him had he tried harder, (which he was never going to do). You can see that he realized his mistake too late and couldn’t get away from that looming left rear tire coming at him and decided he wasn’t going over the curbs so ‘oh well, lets see what happens’ attitude was displayed. I’m sure Merc have the data showing throttle positions, steering angles etc showing him trying to move away without much success. Doesn’t make it a correct way to race but it does show he overestimated his own talent into that corner…

I was responding mainly to people who claimed he ‘did nothing’ to get out of Lewis’s way. I also don’t claim to have ESP – just what I could see on TV. One is allowed to presume what his motivation was or is that illegal in your world TJ?

What I wrote to Mercedes Benz: I was very disappointed by Nico Rosberg’s sportsmanship as exhibited by his on-track driving at the Belgium Grand Prix, and previously at the Monaco Grand Prix. I hope his approach is not reflective of Mercedes-Benz corporate values. I am not interested in owning a product where the company ethos is “win at any cost” as it suggests to me, as a consumer, I will not be treated fairly.

Ced, you of course miss the point. But then you’re to be forgiven as no doubt you can’t afford one. The only thing that will make MB really deal with this situation is if they think it is hurting the brand. There in ends the marketing lesson.

Ouch Lars, that really hurt… Thanks for the marketing lesson, I feel I’ve learned something useful. Let us know what MB reply, it might give us even more marketing insight I bet. What exactly is the point you’re making? That you need to afford an MB in order to understand your opinion on marketing? Or that you make purchasing decisions based on subliminal messages you perceive watching guys race cars… Back to my previous comment, which you can be forgiven for having misunderstood because you are possibly too busy hesitating over which next MB to buy and how you can feel important doing so, I’m sure MB don’t give a toss about your pompous opinion. No offence Lars 😉

Thank you, Ced. I felt so guilty after your rebuke of Lars, that I sent a similar letter to Ferrari telling them that, in the event I was ever in the position to own one of their cars, I wouldn’t buy one because of the way they treated Felipe Massa.

I was so disgusted with it all, I wrote a letter to Mercedes too, and set fire to two of those I own (need the C-Class to do the shopping though, only burned the McMerc and the Kompressor) and pushed them into the fizzy drink swamp, where they failed to sink because of the several Ferraris and an old Williams Clio I pushed in there when they sacked Damon Hill… So as I can clearly afford a fleet of supercars (and a Clio), I imagine my failing to get your point is unforgivable….What was it again? You don’t want to be associated with an essentially luxury product because of the behaviour of a couple of race drivers? I hope you don’t (for instance) wear certain brands of clothing made using slave labour, coz that will REALLY implode your head, air is pretty thin on top of the moral high ground… Oh yeah, and also what Ced said. I doubt Mercedes will be too bothered by your stance, not when I’ve an open cheque book and a couple of empty garages. Hahaha!

Well, Toto and Niki said immediately after the race, on BBC and as reported in GP+ and elsewhere, that Nico’s behaviour was unacceptable. Toto did not even want to comment on the booing, giving the impression – to me at least – that he felt that Nico deserved it.

The race team management must surely be considered to be more representative of the company line than the actions of a frustrated driver in the heat of battle out on the track.

I think that Lars priorities are kind of skewed; Mercedes are still, as far as I have seen, the only team to have the word “Hybrid” in the car name, indicating an environmental focus and a responsible company. They are also the team that very openly have said that they will let their drivers race with a minimum of interference, showing a great sense of fair play.

Would you not consider such things more important than Nico’s split-second decisions when evaluating if you could consider buying their products? I would, but of course we are all different.

Oh dear Ced! Seems that Lars is a more typical Audi driver than a Merc one, ( see Clarkson for analysis ). Frankly, in my personal ownership experience, German cars tend to be wildly overhyped by the British. Ask a German taxi driver about reliability, and generally VW’s get the nod over Merc, while BMW’s get a big thumbs down!

As you say, surprised the FIA didn’t even look at it, if they were in different teams it might have been a different matter.

The constant changing of FIA policy on racing rules doesn’t help judge on these type of grey-area collisions – but I think there needs to be some sort of ‘standard’ punishment applied for contact when there is a clear guilty party, either time added or a small points deduction. In another context runners clipping each other on the running track are simply disqualified!

Otherwise even it was ‘unintended’, which based on the interviews doesn’t look convincing, he’s given himself a significant boost in the championship by at best a poorly executed maneouver.

But it was a great race at least, amongst some fantastic (clean) racing I thought Alonso’s efforts were superb, and seemed to have been broadly missed alongside the collision.

The accident was no different from any other similar contact we see throughout the year. If it was e.g. Max Chilton and Marcus Erricsson doing the same, everyone would go “ha, idiots”. What makes this one special, though, are the participants and the circumstances.

I did not believe for a moment that Nico meant this accident to happen, primarily because it could have ended his or both of their races, too. I said this before Lewis’s interview came out, and after it I received an excrement-storm from people saying “he admitted it, what more proof do you need”? I even said that anyone thinking that he was deliberately trying to put Lewis out of the race was “small-minded”, too, so it didn’t help matters, though 🙂

He tried to play chicken, show some grim face, just didn’t work out. It was an idiotic move for sure, but suggesting that he tried to cut Lewis’s tyre on purpose is just pure madness.

What’s worse is that all the – mainly British – press is still lingering on Lewis’s words (i.e. “basically he said he did it on purpose”), largely disregarding what their respective boss said a few minutes later, which puts the events in a slightly different perspective.

I believe this was virtually meant to happen since the moment it turned out that the Mercedes cars are a league of their own and the two guys were allowed to battle each other.

If it didn’t happen on the 2nd lap, could have happened on the 15th, the 23rd, even on the last lap. If it didn’t happen at this race, could have happened on another one.

Toto Wolff might say it’s ‘unacceptable’ (and it somewhat is), but by no means was it unexpected.

“What’s worse is that all the – mainly British – press is still lingering on Lewis’s words (i.e. “basically he said he did it on purpose”), largely disregarding what their respective boss said a few minutes later, which puts the events in a slightly different perspective.”

There’s a bit of that. But bear in mind that while Hamilton has a vested interest in claiming Rosberg did it deliberately, Merc management (and Rosberg) would prefer to claim that Rosberg didn’t – diffusing the situation largely by quibbling over semantics. Who’s right? Who knows.

No one knows precisely what was said in the meeting except the participants. Lewis has an incentive to describe things in a light most favorable to him. Mercedes management has an incentive to describe things in such a way as to preserve what little harmony still exists within the team.

Or are you inferring that the discussion was confined to Rosberg’s Machiavellian ‘intent’ to disable his teammates car and go on to win. Or the wider and more plausible scenario as it transpired of Hamilton’s intent to cut across Rosberg and run him off the track if and when required.

Maybe just maybe it was Rosberg’s intent not to be bullied into vacating a legitimately held track position and Hamilton’s twofold faux pas of ignoring team orders not to cause a collision and the regulatory requirement to leave space.

Those “crazy” bikers still race on proper road circuits. A commentator for the BBC’s coverage of the Ulster GP described Dundrod (7.4 miles, ~130 mph lap speed on a Superbike) as a short circuit…
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I think Todt is handling F1 track incidents the right way. He has recent experience of running drivers at the top of the grid (very different from Mosley). I understand his position to be that teams sort it out between and within themselves. Perhaps he needs to be more explicit about his intent.

I’m more worried about lack of intervention to control costs at all levels of motor sport.

I my opinion in a few races time when the boos for Rosberg have become entrenched he will regret not having been more contrite on the podium and simply saying that he regretted not having a real fight for the win with Lewis due to the accident. Simply put that was what most fans felt cheated out off and expressed it by booing.

Rosberg writing it off as a racing incident after Monaco stretched his credibility. Blaming it on English fans at Spa etc is dodging the issue he should have handled head on the moment he got booed. That is something he will live to regret as the tarnish sticks to any potential Drivers championship win and I would say colored the opinions of Wolff and Lauda in interviews after the race. Merc needs a winner to promote the brand, not damaged goods. This was simple self inflicted damage.

Everyone wants the championship decided by a fair battle on track. Punting someone off track to win is not what anyone wants to watch. He cheated F1 fans, if he did not cheat by deliberately causing an incident. No one likes or appreciates being cheated so he has to live with that consequence of his actions. He could have braked harder and still passed later on, he chose not too! Deliberate or not almost no longer matters, he has damaged himself and the Rosberg brand, at least for now. As Vettle knows that is not easy to shake off and Rosberg has more uncomfortable podium visits to make UNLESS he steps up and becomes a sportsman.

Very generous in your analysis, Adam. Methinks you let the boorish Hamilton fans off too easily. And, though he’s certainly no arbiter of good behavior, Eddie Jordan seemed surprised and displeased by the boos.

Hamilton is no angel, and neither is Nico. There was no reason for Nico to be “contrite on the podium.” They’re both talented racing drivers and extremely competitive.

Great post Joe. Just wondering if you’ve had much interaction with Toto Wolff, and what your thoughts are on him?

I know he’s be involved in F1 for a few years now, but with Mercedes performances/dramas this year his media presence is much higher. I really like how he comes across, seems like a genuine racer and isn’t afraid to speak his mind in an open and honest way – like an old school team principal.

Let’s be harsh. Lewis is one of the best around, he is fractionally speedier than Nico when he is happy. But Nico has studied the challenge before him in a thorough Germanic manner, probably with lots of advice from compatriots, and they have decided, correctly, that Lewis does not have the mettle to take on a heated personal campaign. That is his weakness.
Nico makes driving errors, while matching, almost, Lewis’s speed. That’s the beauty of 2sec+ advantage engines. There’s about eight drivers who could do very well in Nico’s seat.

Meanwhile the best driver of 2014 is just waking up to the fact that there is a chance he could nab it from both of them. Just like Kimi in 2007.
I think Dan will. I’m betting on it.

Without getting too Freudian, I wonder if that isn’t an issue for Nico? He’s very talented, but doesn’t have the rough edges of Keke. Nico is very fast, but his driving style is much less aggressive than his dad’s (if I remember correctly). I think being compared to his father all the time has been problematic for Nico.

I doubt that being compared to LH as slower than LH all the time, has affected NR much, as ( haven’t checked this ) I saw somewhere that NR has been faster than LH in the last 7 qualy sessions, and he is of course, leading the title fight which he has been doing for most of the year ( all ? ) so far.

I actually like that the FIA has chosen not to look into the incident. Apart from going to the media (which I think was underhanded on Lewis’ part), Lewis has not approached the FIA about Rosberg’s claims. Whether the statement from Rosberg was true or not, Lewis’ choice to go to the media looks more like a means to throw a wrench in Rosberg’s plans. Which to some extent has worked (given the media furor largely at Rosberg’s direction). I don’t believe that calls for an FIA investigation. Rosberg’s silly move hurt him (by costing him a win or 2nd place and giving a 3rd driver some hope for a WDC run) and his team. The team should handle it (which they appear inept at doing). Although he may be too hands off, I think this instance the FIA is right to stay out of the mess.

I really don’t understand. Hamilton is way in front on the straight and Rosberg makes up a ton of ground through the turbulent wake with no DRS coming into the corner. It looked like Hamilton had made a mistake and Rosberg was going to drive right by. However, Hamilton decided to use the chrome horn (sorry NASCAR term) and run Rosberg off the track like in Bahrain. Rosberg didn’t want to get hit but he was tired of off roading due to his teammate’s actions.

I really don’t give a crap who wins but this happens all the time in Indycar with all cars basically the same and any small mistake gives an opening. Most times people will give a little room but some of the time when they don’t and it screws up both racers. Just because someone was more right does not make it the right move.

Last question, is the fastest line through those corners out wide? I thought Riccardo did not run wide through there at all.

Actually I think Dave Ryan went under the bus for Hamilton and the team……….but don’t start going down the ‘naive and innocent’ and now a martyr route, you’ll open a can of worms best left firmly closed.

So glad you’ve stated what other have missed or are deliberately omitting. Ie Nice feels Hamilton has pushed the boundaries to far while defending on numerous occasions. That is why there are none better than you Joe.

I’m told (by people who know alot less than you) that Mercedes ‘action plan’ for the season allowing the drivers to fight included something along the lines of always allowing each other a car width. That Nico feels that Lewis didn’t do this numerous times in Barhain (and the TV pictures i rewatched on a big UK press site yesterday included two remarkably similar ‘chops’ across Nicos nose in Barhain to the one that caused the collision in Belgium on Sunday where Nico clearly backed out of it in Barhain) and then pushed him off the road in Hungary on the last lap. Could there be any truth in Mercedes having set that ‘rule’??

Problem is that it was just so clumsy and so obvious. Unlike Lewis’ ‘dirty tricks’ like turning his engine mapping up against strict instructions when Nico has been quicker than him. Other than the briefest of reports how would any of us even know he did that?? The vast majority of fans wouldn’t, but they would have seen the crash on Sunday.

A view seems to be developing that Rosberg, this season, is being revealed as cynical, devious and underhanded. I just can’t seem to reconcile that notion with anything that I have seen on the racetrack.

What I see is a driver that knows he has to raise his game and improve his driving in areas of relative weakness if he wants to have a chance to compete for this title against a tough, talented and aggressive teammate.

Early in the year he openly admitted that if he was going to have a chance against Lewis, he was going to have to improve his qualifying and his starts. He has done quite a good job of that since his admission (Sunday’s start at Spa aside), though Lewis’ bad run of equipment failures has certainly skewed the results even further in Rosberg’s direction.

The other major area of deficiency in Nico’s driving, often cited by analysts and fans, is his level of proficiency at overtaking and handling the shoulder to shoulder stuff. While he might have been unhappy with the Lewis and the whole team order incident before the summer break, ultimately he had to realize that he was only in that position because he wasn’t able to quickly dispatch Vergne.

At Spa, I clearly got the impression that I was watching a driver try to push himself into uncomfortable territory in order to address the criticism and his own realization that he had to improve. Since there is really no other place for an F1 driver to practice this type of thing, it has to happen on track and during races with a lot on the line. Mistakes and clumsy results like Sunday at Spa are going to be part of the process. Flat spotting his front left tire trying to pass Vettel after the contact with Lewis was another example.

As for the incident with Hamilton, there had to come a time when Rosberg tried to press the reset button on what his chief title rival and others could expect from him in tight, wheel-to-wheel racing. With the relative pace between him and Hamilton being so close, he had to know that if he could continue to be relied upon to back down from Lewis’ bolder, more aggressive style then he would find himself on the losing end more often than not when Lewis’ bad run of reliability woes came to an end.

The fact that the “point” was made so tentatively and in such a clumsy way reflected the naturally more conservative nature of his driving. In the moment that he saw his wing come flying off his car he was probably cursing himself, knowing he likely just gave away his race. The guilty pleasure of seeing Lewis’ puncture must have come as relief, even as it would not have been the goal.

Rosberg is looking to improve his race craft and try to establish a reputation for being less likely to be the guy that will back down. I don’t find anything sinister, cynical or underhanded in any of that.

Lewis has pushed this idea, and his fans and some in the media have been happy to run with it. F1 history has enough nefarious behavior to warrant bringing up the question, but I just don’t see how it sticks to Rosberg in this case.

Very well said. Nico pushes himself, somtimes it works, sometimes it does not. You have to be impressed by this approach, especially coming from someone who could have a very good life even if he took it easy.

Great article, as I’ve come to expect from you. I particularly like how you always add non-race related tidbits, whether it’s a travelogue or complaints about accommodation, airlines etc. to your posts. Makes a welcome change from the normal F1 ‘journalist’ out there!

Do you have any plans to publish your old Globetrotter articles as an (e)book? I for one would buy it immediately. I’ve spent many hours in airplanes in the last years reading those I could find online. Great way to pass the time when I’ve seen all the interesting films.

So “Saint Lewis” never touched another car in the past few years? Come off it, he’s caused more “racing accidents” than anyone else in recent years – even last week he shoved a few people around. This is what happens to bullies – sooner or later someone stands up to them and the cry all the way home to mummy (aka Ron Dennis).

Still the argument stands that a more intelligent racing driver like Button for example would have looked into the mirrors and took evasive action to avoid damage to his and his team mates car and would have still kept his lead by giving the attacker just a bit more space.

Let’s put it in road driving terms, 2 drivers and a roundabout lets call them Smewis and Smico

Smewis is on the roundabout and Smico is about to join. Smico doesn’t slow down and drives straight into Smewis. Now Smewis could have slowed down for Smico but there was no need to as he had right of way and he also could have swerved and avoided it, again he didn’t feel he needed to. So although Smewis could have avoided the accident the blame here is 100% with Smico and this is how the Lewis and Nico incident should be viewed.

I was disgusted by the British fans booing Nico Rosberg on the podium at Spa. It was extremely boorish behavior, as Eddie Jordan pointed out.

Formula One drivers are all about machismo, and Lewis is a very good AND very aggressive driver. My thought is that Nico — usually the more politic of the two — simply wanted to let Hamilton know that he couldn’t be pushed around. It proved disastrous, but that’s racing. And, Lewis whining to the world about what Nico had done sounded a bit like Sebastian Vettel (“He didn’t let me by!!”).

In fact, British fans, Lewis IS a whiner. He whines about the team. He whines about his car. He whines about Nico. He whines.

But what was the point to put his car out to the edge of the track. Hambone had a better line before drifting out.. He could have played it safe and not hit Neko. Hambone had every right to the spot but was it the right thing to do? Basically no because he lost everything!

Quite a predictable reaction from you, Joe.
Lewis is a darling who is innocent of all guilt, it’s just these others who are always at fault.
Lewis decided to close the door on Nico there. And not just close it, but close it with a bang. To spoil Nico’s exit from the corner, and send a message “don’t you even dare to try that again!”. Had he been content with just staying ahead, the incident would not have happened.
Nico wanted to prove a point that he cannot be bullied out of the way again and again (nice, clean overtaking tactics in equal cars don’t work against Lewis, just remember Bahrain), and he did. A couple of years ago Maldonado also refused to be bullied by Lewis. This led to several incidents, and the British press then demonized Pastor.
In general, Lewis tends to expect over drivers to move over for him. Legacy from having never driven for a back-marker or a midfield team, I think. When it doesn’t happen, he is confused and angry.
Having said all that, I still think it was a racing incident, with both parties equally guilty. If Nico wanted to prove a point, and do it by not getting out of Lewis’s way, he made a mess of it. And will suffer for it.
Now’s the time Mercedes will really miss Brawn. Lauda and Wolff are clearly incapable of managing these two. Somehow I believe, Ross could have done a much better job there.
All this IMHO, of course 🙂

You say it yourself. Nico did it on purpose. That is the whole story. It has got nothing to do with the British press. besides if you knew anything you would know that I am not at all British. I have lived abroad for 25 years and am completely out of that world so your analysis is simplistic and formulaic.

Lewis racing like Senna has nothing to do with the British press but it stirrs controversy for it often ends in collisions and that’s where the British press steps in for it usually absorbs Lewis from any wrongdoing. And when someone spells this out the British press’s answer is usually ‘You don’t know what happened there’.

Well considered and clear, the only minor point I might disagree with is I don’t see Rosberg suffering, if only because he’s done absolutely nothing to feel sorry about. Furthermore the task/goal of demonstrating that he’ll be fair but no pussycat on track was well made and earlier then expected with minimal effect on his WDC. In this case the outcome isn’t really any less then Hamilton deserved and may point to the existence of Karma.

But do I see Hamilton ‘learning’ from the experience…well he frequently talks about ‘learning from his mistakes’ but has a poor record in doing so. the reality is I don’t expect a more circumspect Hamilton any time in the future, if at all.

But the best reaction was from Mercedes in the horror of an second lap (with the emphases on 2nd lap) coming together for their team, interestingly they failed to identify after which lap this if replicated it would be acceptable.

While I agree that Rosberg is to blame for the incident, I do find the fallout to be overblown. His words were misrepresented by Hamilton and not really an admission of guilt.

You may buy into Hamilton’s “naive and innocent” public persona, but I for one believe his off-track actions are a lot more calculated than they appear to be.
However, I think he is sufficiently confident to believe he doesn’t need to play dirty, and it is fair to say that he is the better wheel-to-wheel driver (in the words of Coulthard).

I think now needs to come the realization that it takes more than driving ability to become champion. He destroyed his rookie opportunity in 2007, lucked into it in 2008, but this year luck is not on his side and he will have to figure out what more to do to stop Rosberg’s ascension.

You can tow the unofficial UK press line and portray Rosberg as the villain and Hamilton as the hero, or you can acknowledge that Rosberg is the less talented driver who is simply doing a better job at the moment.

He may be a klutz in wheel to wheel combat, but on the whole, he has certainly impressed me with his consistency this season. I never liked his dad, I don’t like him, but respect where respect is due.

Well, I suppose you know Hamilton better than I do at any rate, so I won’t argue that point. But Wolff has since rebutted Hamilton’s “Nico did it on purpose” exclamations.

David Coulthard expresses my view on the matters succinctly:

[i]I stand by what I said in commentary that Rosberg was of the mindset: “I have to show Lewis that I am not prepared to keep opening the steering in these situations.”

He opened the steering in Bahrain and Hungary, because he had no choice, and that’s what he should have done in Spa, because again he had no choice.

As it was, he did open the steering. Then, when he realised he was going to run off the circuit, he turned back in again and, in a clumsy manoeuvre, clipped Hamilton’s rear tyre with his front wing, causing a puncture.
Rosberg leads the title race by 29 points from Hamilton

Rosberg leads the title race by 29 points from Hamilton

It’s easy for people sitting outside the cars to say Rosberg deliberately hit Hamilton’s rear wheel with his front wing. But I cannot believe for one moment a driver would consciously damage his own car.

Drivers know you can’t nudge someone with your nose, because you lose your front wing. It’s just not a viable strategy.

There is also no way a driver can judge where exactly to hit a rival’s tyre with his wing to guarantee a puncture. [/i]

Both those drivers were and are (quite rightly) considered legends. So why, when Rosberg does something similar, is he treated otherwise? Maybe he’s not “legend” status, but there are too many with double-standards.

Well Mr Saward I’d never have taken you for being blinkered nor ill informed but while “naive and innocent” he may be in your world may I suggest reading another and quite different opinion.

Matthew Syed from ‘The Times’ says: “There is also a pervasive feeling that the driver is aloof and manipulative: a cleverly spun, commercially groomed media creation with whom many feel little or no affinity.”.

Mr Syed goes on to report on his “barefaced deceit” and that ordinary bloggers along with some media reports agree he’s confrontational, arrogant, selfish and mendacious.

“naive and innocent” not unless he’s suddenly sprouted wings and is sitting on a cloud between GP’s……

I am sorry to pop your balloon but Matthew Syed is not someone I have encountered in my career in F1 and I’ve been to every F1 race for 26 years so you’d think I might know all the real F1 experts. I believe the gentleman in question is a bit of a whizz in table tennis but not in F1. If you base your arguments about F1 on the views of a table tennis expert what do you expect to be? An expert yourself or someone without the faintest idea of what you are talking about?

I see nothing about F1, and a lot about the character of someone involved in F1. One need not be present at a GP to see someone and how they deal with others. Perhaps Lewis is well behave, innocent and darling on GP weekends when you see him, but raping and pillaging during the week when you are nowhere to be found. 😛

Perfect Joe. It’s ironic that ” naïve ” keeps getting typed. I once had the opportunity to talk with one of the old hands in Fleet Street . He said that he had to fly to Baden Baden the next day to interview some body for a story that his newspaper was running . He claimed that he had written the item prior and all he had to do was get a few photos and names and details before flying back to London, so it was going to be a good gig. I became a little less “naive ” about what I read in ” newspapers” post that little eye opener! What next “tiddlywinks Expert will report next Grand Eprouve sic while Raymond Baxster is on holiday!” Lol

Laugh ! MM certainly thought it was a perk of the profession ! No Joe , the point I was so clumsy in trying to illustrate ,was that a lot of posters here were quoting ill informed media ,that as you have taken great pains in the past to point out ,know sweet fanny Adams about F1 . Exhibit A “The Thunderers ” table tennis corespondent ! For them ,if it is in print ,its Gospel .

Hi Joe, Someone who has worked for me professionally, and that I’ve known for 20 years, has also worked for RD & FW and respective teams. This person has known LH since he was promoted to F1, and would agree with your view of him at that point in time….not sure if they would now though….I will have to ask the Q when I see them next!

Rosberg has managed to paint himself tightly into the corner marked “devious and underhanded”, but my guess is that if he thought at all (in the instant before he turned back in on Lewis), he was trying to send a message that this was a new, muscular Nico, who wasn’t going to be pushed around on the racetrack any more and who had no need of team orders or Q3 trips down escape roads.

There’s a difference between “I could have backed out but I chose to maintain my track position and try to finish the pass” and “He hit me on purpose to try to give me a puncture.” Lewis has managed to make his version the received wisdom, but no-one outside the room knows whether that’s an accurate summary of what Rosberg said, or the reaction of a very upset man who thinks he has just been shanked by his teammate.

In any case, it will be interesting to see, in the weeks ahead, whether Toto and Niki are angrier at Nico for running into his teammate, or at Lewis for causing the world’s English-speaking media to portray a Mercedes driver and possible WDC as a sort of nomex-clad Machiavelli.

Your last paragraph mentions a very interesting point. One which few commentators have said anything about.

Much of the uproar is due to Lewis talking about team internals and even misrepresenting them. For the second race in a row he has forced the team bosses to publicly comment on team internals and to set the record straight.

I cannot imagine that this goes down well with the people in power in Stuttgart. Is this the sort of behavior they expect from a Mercedes driver? I fear that Lewis is jeopardizing his standing within the team through his behavior on and off the track.

What an interesting post from you, Joe. More interesting travel adventures and history of racing information. And what an interesting analysis of the recent Mercedes team-mates foolishness at Spa.

There is at least one North American example of a major team protesting against itself over race results. After the May 1970 Trans-Am race in New Hampshire Team Penske protested the official scoring for the fifth place position-I believe.

After the hearing and review Penske’s personal favorite driver Mark Donahue was advanced to fifth place in the official order. The other team driver, Peter Revson was moved back to sixth place. Revson must have gotten the message, for by the next year he was driving for a different team in the major events.( I believe that team was McLaren, which far outdistanced Penske and Donahue for quite awhile.)

Revson was early on thought to be too much of a wealthy playboy to be taken seriously. He fairly quickly proved himself to be a very fine driver who drove in several classes of ferocious machines with good success. The history of racing can be fun-and we will certainly be remembering Spa of 2014.

” Nico did not set out to crash into Lewis at Les Combes on lap 2 of the Belgian Grand Prix, but he did make the conscious decision not to back out of a place where he ought not to have been when he tried to overtake. He said he was proving a point. Showing Lewis, presumably, that he cannot always treat the race track as his own territory as he tends to do in a fight.”

I can think of 2 other times off the top of my head where Ham knocked himself out of a race for thinking that way, and both times, the opponents pretty much said the same thing Nico said. Koba at Spa, and Web at Sing a couple back (iirc). Ham was trying to pass them at the time, got in front and cut them, making contact, and knocked himself out of the race. I see little difference here, as Lewis drove into Nico, not Nico drove into Lewis.

I see this as much ado about nothing. Probably some folks trying to hype stuff in hopes of re-creating a Senna – Prost type rivalry to increase views/popularity. I predict media fail though…

Lewis made a stupid error against Kobayashi not realising that he had lost speed. As for the example with Webber I believe he has learnt from this as he did not allow enough room for Webber although I still feel this was more Webber’s fault.

The thing with Lewis though is apart from that horrible 6 months in 2011 his racing has been great. Some of his battles and overtakes have been incredible. Just like Alonso he seems able to do things that the others can’t.

What’s “ironic” about this? Or even the 2014 incident? If you’d seen the above in 2010 you wouldn’t be surprised by NR’s being a clumsy jerk in 2014, and if you’re starting in 2014, looking back how can you not expect more evidence of NR’s lack of true wheel-to-wheel skill vs. a World Champ like Hamilton – or MS?

Ahh, Ok. Not sure that’s “ironic” per se, as much as hypocritical on NR’s part, but perhaps ironic from the perspective of the fan who discovers video of the 2010 incident after listening to Nico obfuscate and spin about how he was making a legit move and Hammy should’ve been more aware/accommodating. Cheers.

I was in Montreal several years ago seated on the start/finish line when Hamilton ran into the back of Webber’s car on the pit lane exit. I remember feeling that Hamilton seemed a very reckless driver and being soundly chastised by my mates for that opinion.

How is the German media playing this Joe? Rosberg seemed sure he would have their support when interviewed by Lee McKenzie.

I don’t like the booing, it’s not British, but then most of the standards we were brought up with, have disappeared, been hideously twisted or completely inverted.

France appears to be almost entirely composed of old race tracks, no matter in which direction you travel, you seem to come across them.
Is there perhaps a map of same? (If not maybe another future book project)

Mercedes are the real losers; I sensed that from Toto’s comments afterwards. An almost certain 1 – 2 turned out to be…..a 2. As for the drivers, on reflection, I think that they both knew what they were doing.

Great piece, absolutely bang on the nail I would say. Rosberg is cracking under the pressure but Hamilton got the bad break this time. That’s a shame because up until Spa, when they have raced wheel to wheel this season it’s been great.

I kind of get a kick out of some people, all over the internet, saying how Mercedes should ban Rosberg for a race or so. What they’re neglecting to realize is that Mercedes in in the battle for both championships. Pulling Rosberg out for a race is shooting themselves in the foot. While Rosberg did take his team mate out of the race, for all intensive purposes, no doubt he was millimeters away from taking himself out of the race.Surely things were quite heated behind closed doors and who knows how Mercedes can discipline their own driver without hurting their own championship quests? If anything, it was the responsibility of the FIA to impose a penalty of none nature or another. the FIA pulled a Pontius Pilate and washed their hands of the affair. Consequently, there’s a chance we may never know what type of penalty Mercedes imposes, as it could very well be a financial deduction off Rosberg’s salary…. providing Mercedes left a clause open for that? On the flip side, having two number one drivers allowed to race each other, of course they did.

Great piece as usual. I feel rather flattered that my (entirely formed-from-watching-tv) impression of Lewis is the same as yours: slightly naive and innocent (and for that reason all the more shocked at the possibility of dirty tricks by competitors – hence so vocal about them).

That brings me to an interesting phenomenon: that many people seem to be (very outspokenly) unable to believe that someone like Lewis CAN be naive. Many people seem to cling to a notion that everybody else is doing pretty much everything on purpose. Probably makes apportioning blame easier.

Or maybe they just confuse “naive” with “saintly” and assume that you (or anyone claiming Lewis to be naive) are exonerating them of any mortal sins (which you make clear you do not).

Interesting article, but it does seem to rest on one significant assumption – namely, that Hamilton’s post-race comments accurately reflect what Rosberg said and did. Given both Rosberg himself and the team have disputed Hamilton’s interpretation of events, there is room for doubt about whether they do indeed reflect either accurately. For all the talk of Peter Pan-like innocence (and let’s not forget, Peter Pan cut Captain Hook’s hand off and fed it to a crocodile so he’s not particularly innocent in the first place…), Hamilton has been in motorsport a long time and is not above mind games himself – the comments about his and Rosberg’s comparative upbringings, for example. For me, his post-meeting comments were more akin to another aspect of childhood – the aftermath of a playground squabble, and one child trying to get another in as much trouble as possible with the teacher. No doubt he felt highly aggrieved about the incident (and he had every right to be in light of the consequences of it), but the way he phrased his remarks – particularly the “go ask Toto and Paddy yourselves” aspect – makes it seem more calculating than just an expression of frustration. He was trying to settle the score, with interest, by making a racing incident seem far more than it was. In the end it hasn’t worked, at least as far as the FIA is concerned (and I believe rightly – as a lot of professional drivers called it at the time, it was a racing incident), and I’m not sure it’ll work within Mercedes either. I can understand why Hamilton would feel very unhappy about what happened on Sunday, but shooting off his mouth to the media runs the risk of making him look like he has a chip on his shoulder. His comments after Monaco in 2011 spring to mind…

Thanks for the post a most astute comment on the events of the weekend, coupled with some informed comments by your contributers. Its the reason I log in everyday. As someone once said, ‘It’s the passion.’

And when the noise dies down and the racing begins again, will Rosberg still have that additional 18 points versus Lewis? Of course he will, and hence all the brickbats and arguments will have been worth it to him. Poor show F1 😦

Nico is exhibiting classic passive aggressive behavior. Probably was that way all his racing career but the spotlight was never on him so it was hidden. Now with the attention firmly on him and Lewis we will probably see a lot more of this type of behavior from him.

I cannot believe it has not been said yet: Where did Nico expect Lewis to disappear to? It reminds me of The Simpsons episode where Lisa starts walking towards Bart while swinging her legs in a kicking action… “I’m going to kick like this and walk towards you, and if you get hit, it’s your own fault!”

I don’t see how anyone could expect Lewis to disappear his car out of Nico’s way on such a banzi overtake attempt. Honestly there was a bit of Maldonado in car 6… or if I’m being generous, it was akin to something Checo would do. It was ridiculous. The move was never on.

Kind of reminded me of Pastor chucking his car into Lewis’ path in Valencia… nothing to gain and no intelligence needed, just chuck it into the gap which is disappearing and see is Lewis’ car invisible!

To top it all off, it just doesn’t suit Nico. It’s not his style, the move just looked desperate, and was of course, unnecessary. As commented already, all he had to do was wait until lap 3 and take him on the straight, then park his car on the apex and make his point to Lewis that way.

He knows he is ahead in the points and so throwing his car around Lewis is a move he can more afford to do. That’s not my idea of a worthy World Champion. If he wants to win it without support like Vettel, then fine, he’s doing a good job. But he’ll not be the people’s champion if that’s the only way he is capable of getting there.

I try hard to be objective, and ignored the Monaco nonsense, but Spa’s activities bring serious doubt to Nico’s tactics. And unfortunately they cannot be denied as blankly as they were in Monaco.

Joe I won’t comment on Ham vs Ros but the real story of the race is what’s happened to Vettel? He was comprehensively outdriven by his team mate for not the first time this year. Ok he has had some bad luck with reliability – usually the preserve of his former team mate – but he Ricciardo ran away with the race between the Red Bulls after he passed Vettel who seems to be making more driving errors this year than he has made in the past four.

If you adopt a similar outlook to that employed by most legal systems, you would look at the incident in a few ways. When trying to decide Rosberg’s guilt(or lack thereof) you would look at the act, and his state of mind. The act being that Rosberg attempted an overtake, it didn’t work, and in the process a collision happened which was avoidable. The three states of mind, in order of severity, that you would look for are
1: Did Rosberg intend to cause a collision? Or
2: Was Rosberg Reckless in his approach, causing a collision by not driving safely or
3: was Rosberg Completely negligent to his responsibilities not to cause an avoidable collision.

Intent, Recklessness or Negligence would be the best way to summarise the three states of mind. An offence would usually be complete when the state of mind , coincides with the act.

At the time of the crash, the stewards probably thought Rosberg was legitimately racing Hamilton, thought there would be more space and made a genuine honest mistake, this would be a “racing incident” whereby the act obviously exists but Rosberg doesn’t have the guilty frame of mind, there isn’t that coincidence.

With the alleged comments from Rosberg being that he did it to prove a point, this could be considered Negligent. More likely it should be considered intent. In that moment, Rosberg’s intent was to cause a collision. With that in mind, he should receive sanction from the FIA.

Who would have bet on Nico leading from Lewis at this point in the season? It’s not Prost/Senna or Piquet/Mansell but it will do as far as intra-team dramas go. I say let them work it out on the track. Rosberg is putting together a really scruffy campaign, but it beats seeing Hamilton sail off into the distance every fortnight. Serious people aren’t really thinking Nico will be punished by the team, are they?

You made me stop and think about Lewis, personally I don’t have much time for Lewis, maybe this is a reflection of the rabid fan base he has or the single minded British Media..he is certainly a talented driver but many others are also talented.

But as I said you made me think and for all the years I have been watching and listening Lewis your description is probably most apt. on reflection it explains much about his behavior.

i watched live the theater of Senna and Prost in measure it was exciting and also frustrating that people could act like this. I don’t think we are quite that close yet but a few more races might tell a different story.

Rosberg was well along side Hamilton at the apex of the right bend. Hamilton (looking at my super slo Hd) is not on the racing line coming out of the turn, Rosberg has squeezed him to the right. Hamilton was aware Rosberg was there and could have saved himself the hurt by giving a little space going into the left.
Rosberg holding his line has had the “prove a point” effect he was looking for, Hamilton will be cautious in wheel to wheel racing and Hamilton being cautious has got to be an advantage to Rosberg.

This is racing. A driver attacks. The driver under pressure is allowed to defend. The defending driver is allowed to take the racing line. The attacking driver, when seeing the move won’t stick, has a duty to avoid a collision. Hamilton had the racing line. Rosberg made a conscious decision not to back off.

Sorry I missed it too. Are we looking at the replays or the press for the intent? The replays show an accident pretty common to F1 and the only claim of intent I have read came from Hamilton and started with “basically”.

Sporting Regs-20.4…. “For avoidance of doubt, if any part of the front wing, of the car attempting to pass is alongside of the rear wheel of the car in front this will be deemed to be a “significant portion”.

Well I’m not sure I agree with your conclusion Brent: that Hamilton will be more cautious around Rosberg in future just because of this incident. In fact I could imagine quite the opposite actually. If you consider the risks for Rosberg now, will he want to play at “making his point” again? Could this in fact be an advantage for Hamilton in the next races? Can we agree that Hamilton has more wheel to wheel racing ability than Rosberg and as such, in future, he will definitely not be backing down or giving space, why should he? Rosberg has more to lose and this in my opinion could be a key to the way the next races play out. What do you think?

There is no doubt in my mind that Rosberg is not the driver Hamilton is. I believe it is fairly clear in Rosberg’s mind as well. He doesn’t need to prove his point again, Hamilton just has to believe he would. Besides it’s all through the press how clumsy Rosberg is…”oops I did again”.

I think that is the problem with Rosberg, the guy is quick, but he reminds me of Damon Hill if he has a far faster car than other drivers he can overtake but when he is behind a car with similar performance his lack of race craft lets him down. He was lucky this time that it only ruined Hamilton race and not his, for me the only point he proved is that he is not to be trusted.

Yes Hamilton would have known there was a car alongside him and of course who it was.

But Rosberg had to be a minimum by way of an overlap and the FIA gives us some guidance of how much that is for Hamilton to be obligated to provide sufficient space, that figure is a credible “significant portion”, but they go further…..

FIA: For the avoidance of doubt, if any part of the front wing of the car attempting to pass is alongside the rear wheel of the car in front this will be deemed to be a ‘significant portion’.

And? It doesn’t matter that I am British. You writing this is actually insulting me because you are saying that I am unable to write a neutral report because I do not have the brains to get beyond blind nationalism. If you stop to think about it, it is not the kind of conclusion that a truly intelligent man would come up with.

I do hate how people bring up the subject of being Brtitish in a negative way to further their opinions. It immediately marks the writer out as none too bright in my opinion. If they don’t like the British media then don’t read them, it’s quite simple.On the subject of the booing of Rosberg, given that most of those booing have paid big money to watch and travel to the GP, I think they are perfectly entitled to show their displeasure in situations like this. Great blog Joe

I have just read my way through all 239 comments (to date) – well, I am on my staycation in Herefordshire, after all.

My intention is to respectfully point out that the true sub-plot here has been overlooked by all commentators, yourself included.

This has nothing to do with Hungary, Monaco, Montreal or Bahrain… In fact, when the matter of Rosberg’s nationality was being discussed and his Germanic-ness being scrutinised, Lewis laughed it off by claiming (in good humour – after all, they are chums) that a little rich boy from Monaco could not possibly be German…

Well, more fool him and all the other naysayers. Now Nico has his baedeker for ‘Ze Precise Formula For Vinning Ze Vorld Championship In Ze Manner Befitting Unt German Racing Car Operative’, hence we can expect to see far more brinksmanship, questionable tactics and diva-style shitfits until the end of the season. Allied with an insatiable work-rate and it’ll be job done soon enough…

Fantastic write-up, Joe. Really appreciate how you are fair to Hamilton and appropriately skeptical of Rosberg – and a bit more than subtlely condemnatory – w/o appearing in any way biased. Your writing truly is refined and sophisticated.

I don’t check your site daily, but every time I return I’m struck by the quality of the prose and the just-right amt. of cynical jadedness (appropriate, but not too cynical) perceptible in the work of the world-weary traveling scribe!

You should try to do this for a living! Bet there’s big $$$ to be had!

As you rightly say, this latest incident which was so abundantly clear in terms of fault/blame, has put into question all those previous incidents where the benefit of the doubt has been given. I really really really wondered, when re-watching the Monaco incident, just what Nico was doing with the steering. It looked at best slightly odd, but benefit of doubt went to brake balance etc. Now I’m honestly thinking he may just have parked it ‘à la Schumacher’.

Regarding the unfortunate frequency of these wing incidents and their consequences:

I’ve wonder why the material that wings are made of hasn’t been changed, mandatorily, to something like aluminium … I’m no engineer, but something that doesn’t sheer off exposing tyre ripping material on the car and strewn across the track. This sort of incident has spoiled so many grand prix in the last several years.

Another thought; might some teams weave their wing’s carbon fibre in a certain way, that it may become more likely to cut, than when weaved in another? I have no idea if this is even feasible.